Small Programs 1999 Abstracts

Small Programs Interest Group

Integrating Active Learning, Critical Thinking and Multicultural Education in Teaching Media Ethics Across the Curriculum • Tom Brislin, University of Hawaii • This paper presents four teaching strategies, grounded in pedagogical theory, to encourage an active, challenging, creative and meaningful experience for journalism and mass communication students grappling with moral issues, and developing higher order thinking in ethical decision-making processes. Strategies emphasizing critical thinking and diversity awareness have shown success in lower-division media and society classes. Strategies emphasizing active and collaborative learning have been effective in an upper-division journalism ethics class as well as in professional journalism groups.

Codes of Ethics: Shaping the Classroom Environment and Building Moral Decision-making Skills • Carroll Ferguson Nardone, El Paso Community College • A recent study concluded that codes of ethics are not typically used in media outlets to guide journalistic behavior. This is problematic for teachers of media ethics who often point to professional codes as doctrine for students to follow in defining conventional journalistic standards. This case study suggests the creation and use of classroom codes of ethics within media writing classrooms to train future media practitioners and to guide ethical behavior in the workplace.

Teaching Media Ethics to Superman instead of Underdog: A Content Analysis of Three Textbooks’ Cases • Virginia Whitehouse, Whitworth College • Media ethics textbooks may be teaching to Superman (the news manager) rather than Underdog (the undergraduate looking for a first job). Content analysis of case studies from three media ethics textbooks revealed that students were asked most often to take on the role of media managers in making ethical decisions. This pedagogical approach may not help students reach course objectives because the cases do not allow students to exercise critical thinking skills necessary to articulate ethical opinions from low positions of power.

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